Teru Kuwayama: How To Not Get Shot

Photo © Teru Kuwayama-All Rights ReservedA veteran documentary photographer, Teru Kuwayama has made more than 15 trips to Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Kashmir, traveling both independently, and as an embedded reporter with US and NATO military forces, as well as Afghan, Pakistani, and Indian armed forces. In 2009 he received the Dorothea Lange-Paul Taylor award for his work in Pakistan, and a fellowship from the South Asian Journalists Association.He is a 2009-2010 Knight Fellow at Stanford University, a contributor to Time, Newsweek and Outside magazines, and a contract photographer for Central Asia Institute, a non-profit organization that builds schools for children in remote areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan.GIZMODO has featured Teru's...

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Posted in: Afghanistan,Iraq,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism

Jean Claude Louis: Asia Polaroids

Jean Claude Louis was born in France, and moved to Southern California in 1990. He's a physician and scientist, and had a life-long career in biomedical research. He now is pursuing his passions: travel and photography.I've featured Jean-Claude Louis' work through the many photographic contests he won in 2007 and 2008. He participated and won (in specific categories) awards in National Geographic International competition, the Travel Photographer of the Year competition (two categories), and the B&W Magazine Portfolio Competition. He returns to TTP with his Polaroid images of Asia...countries such as Myanmar, India, Viet Nam and China. In Jean Claude's own words:In the Shadow of Time "is homage to the natural environment of these places...

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Posted in: Asia,China,Photographers: Travel,Vietnam

Damon Winter: The Kamayurá

Photo © Damon Winter/NYTimes-All Rights ReservedDamon Winter and The New York Times bring us An Ancient Society, a multimedia essay (narrated by Elisabeth Rosenthal) on the Kamayurá, an Amazonian tribe living in the middle of Xingu National Park in Brazil. This area was a huge swathe of land originally in the depths of the Amazon, but which is is now surrounded by farms and ranches.The article reports that around 5,000 square miles of Amazon forest are being cut down annually in recent years, affecting the environment and depriving the Kamayurá of their way of life. Nicely photographed by Damon, the audio slideshow's narration is somewhat stilted, and, for my taste, there isn't enough ambient sound to add what I call "aural texture" to the...

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Posted in: Brazil,Multimedia,Photojournalism

Moise Saman: Lost Boys of Afghanistan

Photo © Moise Saman/NYTimes-All Rights Reserved“Afghanistan is hemorrhaging its youth into Europe” said Pierre Henry, director of France Terre d’Asile, an organization that works with the European Union, the United Nations refugee agency and the French government on asylum affairs.As per The New York Times' The Lost Boys of Afghanistan, one of the consequences of the war in Afghanistan are the young (some as young as 12) refugees who seek an education and a safe future currently impossible in their own country. It appears that the European nations where these youngsters seek refuge are obliged under national and international law to provide for them; adding a few thousands to the many more of illegal migrants. The photographs are by Moise Saman,...

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Posted in: Afghanistan,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism

Outside Magazine: Antonin Kratochvil

Photo © Clay Enos-All Rights Reserved "Antonin detests the notion of self-aggrandizement that photographers make a living off of," says Gary Knight, a colleague of Kratochvil's and co-founder of VII.That's a statement that made me pay close attention to the interview with Antonin Kratochvil published by Outside magazine. I've been gnashing my teeth and rolling my eyes at this very attitude which is exhibited by so many photographers these days; especially those who are deemed to be "conflict" or "war" photographers. And here's a interview which tells us that Antonin rejects the "war photographer" label outright and hates the self-promotional concept of bearing witness that's in vogue among some photojournalists....a feeling just up my alley.A...

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Posted in: Interviews,Photographers: Photojournalists

Google & Twitter Followers

I see that The Travel Photographer blog now has 200 Google Followers and 386 Twitter Followers....so I thought I'd thank them all with this post. Thank you! It's quite a milestone on this blog's trajectory.I'm always bemused that this blog attracts thousands of loyal readers on a daily basis, who arrived from disparate sources such as Facebook, Twitter, Google, and other search engines e...

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Posted in: Events

Professional Photographer Contest

Professional Photographer magazine is one of the many excellent photography magazines in the United Kingdom. It now has launched a photography contest, and asks if its readers (and others) have what it takes to be the Professional Photographer of the Year 2009? The Professional Photographer awards will be judged by a panel of judges along with the editor of Professional Photographer magazine, Grant Scott. Travel is one of the many categories that are available for interested photographers to compete in.The closing date for 2009 submissions will be November 27, 2009.As in all and every photography contests, I strongly encourage all interested photographers to make sure they carefully read the contests' terms and conditions, especially since...

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Posted in: Contests

Dhiraj Singh: LENS

It is with considerable gratification that I learned this morning that Dhiraj Singh's work has appeared on The New York Times' LENS blog. A few of of us had known that this was in the works while we were at the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop, and it materialized as we hoped it would. Yes, good things happen to good people.Dhiraj, as readers of this blog now know, attended my class "Introduction To Multimedia Storytelling" at the workshop, and produced an absolutely stunning photo essay, for which he was deservedly honored for by winning the workshop’s top honors for student work.His beautiful black & white work on Kashmir is now featured on the LENS blog, in which seeks to document a Kashmir that is defined by more than the decades-long...

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Posted in: India,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism

Marc Silber Interviews Deanne Fitzmaurice

In this video interview, Marc Silber discusses photography techniques with Deanne Fitzmaurice, a Pulitzer Prize winning photojournalist. Deanne talks about how to approach your subject, and how to “layer” (a perceptive term) one's photographs and of multimedia, among other things. While not really new, there is sensible advice in this video, and it's given in an attractive low-key non patronizing conversational tone. Highly recommended interview for its content and for its style.Via The Cl...

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Posted in: Photo Interviews

Boston Globe's Ramadan

Photo © Fareed Khan/AP Photo-All Rights ReservedThe Boston Globe's Big Picture is featuring Ramadan 2009, a collection of 39 photos celebrating the advent of the month of Ramadan in the Muslim world."In Muslim nations and regions around the globe, this is the first week of the holy month of Ramadan, a time for followers to abstain from eating, drinking, smoking and sexual activity during the day, breaking their fast each sunset, with traditional meals and sweets. During this time, Muslims are also encouraged to read the entire Quran, to give freely to those in need, and strengthen their ties to God through prayer. The goal of the fast is to teach humility, patience and sacrifice, and to ask forgiveness, practice self-restraint, and pray for...

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Posted in: Events,Photojournalism

RESOLVE blog Features FPW's Multimedia

My Name is Dechen - Foundry Workshop Multimedia By Dhiraj Singh from liveBooks on Vimeo.Miki Johnson, Editor of the RESOLVE blog, interviewed two photographers who participated in this year's Foundry Photojournalism, and posted their multimedia projects as well.One of the two participants, Dhiraj Singh, attended my class Introduction To Multimedia Storytelling, and produced an absolutely stunning tour de force photo essay, which can now be seen in the above embedded video. Dhiraj was deservedly honored for this work by winning the workshop’s top honors for student work.The other participant was Tristan Wheelock, who attended the Intermediate Multimedia class by Henrik Kastenskov of Bombay Flying Club.The interviews and multimedia work produced by Dhiraj and Tristan can be seen on RESOLVE.Dhiraj...

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Posted in: Multimedia,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism,Soundslides

Landon Nordeman: The Sugar Train (Cuba)

The Atlantic magazine recently featured this slideshow (they call it video) of photographs by Landon Nordeman during a train journey in Cuba. It's accompanied by an evocatively written article by Michael Scott Moore titled The 12:39 To Matanzas, which I enjoyed. However, I can't say the same of the slideshow. Clearly cobbled together by someone with an inordinate affection for panning and camera movements, I don't think I've seen a single frame in the slideshow (or video) that doesn't have the annoying pan from one side to the other, or going from one direction to the other, without a real reason for the movement.I always start off my multimedia classes and workshops by telling participants to keep their projects simple, and to use effects sparingly, and only when it's absolutely required...

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Posted in: Cuba,Multimedia

WSJ Photo Journal: Onam

Photo © Sivaram V./Reuters-All Rights ReservedThe Wall Street Journal's Photo Journal has this striking photograph of a dancer about to perform during festivities marking the start of the annual harvest festival of Onam in Kochi, India. The festival symbolizes the return of mythical King Mahabali to meet his beloved subjects. Readers and followers of this blog and my work will immediately recognize that this is Theyyam performer who, as those I've photographed last January, and can be seen in my Theyyam gallery, is part of an indigenous religious tradition in the north of Kerala.However, I wasn't aware that Theyyam rituals are performed during Onam, which is the state festival of Kerala. The festival includes snake boat races, Pulikali (tiger)...

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Posted in: Festivals,India,Photojournalism

Book: Dalrymple's Nine Lives

One of my favorite haunts when I'm in London is Stanfords, the travel bookstore close to Covent Gardens...and one of my favorite authors is William Dalrymple. So when both come together in an event to be held at the Royal Geographical Society, I am ready with my credit card to buy a ticket. However, as I will still be in Bhutan on October 7, I will miss the event, but look forward to buying the book when I am in London.I posted about Nine Lives earlier on T...

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Posted in: Books,Events,India

At War: Tyler Hicks

Photo © Tyler Hicks-All Rights ReservedWell, the headlines this morning on Afghanistan are not encouraging, what with the rigged elections and with American military commanders in the country telling Richard Holbrooke (President Obama’s chief envoy to the region) that they did not have enough troops to do their job, pushed past their limit by "Taliban" rebels who operate across borders.The usage of "Taliban" for every single insurgent (whatever his connection) in Afghanistan is really getting way past its expiration date...or the other one that is really getting so stale that one can almost smell it, is Al-Qaida...or even better, "Al-Qaida-affiliated"....as if the people living in the badlands and caves of Pakistan northern regions have an...

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Posted in: Afghanistan,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism

POV: Reuters Blog: f8 & Be There

Photo © Zainal AbdHalim/Reuters-All Rights ReservedReuters Photographers Blog has a post on a Muslim woman who is scheduled to be caned next week in Malaysia for committing the offence of drinking beer in public. Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno will be the first Malaysian (other news outlets report that she's from Singapore) woman to be caned under Islamic laws (Sharia') applicable to Malaysia’s Muslims, who account for about 60% of its population, and is fueling a furious debate over tolerance in this multi-racial country.Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno has asked that the punishment be carried out in public in an attempt to shame the Malaysian authorities, and Reuters is asking photographers to let them know how they would go about photographing this...

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Posted in: POV

Book: 100 New York Photographers

I am featured in Cynthia Dantzig's new book: 100 New York Photographers. I haven't seen the book yet, but I expect to have a double-spread page, and perhaps even two full double pages. A number of my photographs of Bali, Ethiopia, Bhutan, Burma and India were chosen, and I'm impatient to see which made it to the book's pages.Cynthia, a professor at Long Island University, just published 100 New York Photographers, a 442-page review of the great range of contemporary New York photographers and their diverse, surprisingly divergent, images. It presents their subject matter and their very definitions of photography, darkroom and digital. Their photographs have been seen in publications, galleries, and museums.Included are such iconic figures...

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Posted in: Books,Photographers

Live Hope Love

Here's a brilliantly done multimedia reporting project HOPE: Living & Loving With HIV in Jamaica, which was commissioned by the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. It's an expansive project by poet and writer Kwame Dawes who travels to Jamaica and explores the experience of people living with HIV/AIDS, and examines how the disease has shaped their lives. In this feature, people tell their stories, share their lives and talk about resilience, hope and possibility in the face of despair. Some are living with the disease; others have committed their lives to HIV/AIDS care.Photography is by Joshua Cogan. The Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting is an innovative non-profit leader in supporting the independent international journalism that U.S....

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Posted in: Multimedia,Photojournalism

Afghanistan: Choices

Photo © Raheb Homavandi/Reuters-Courtesy WSJ Photo JournalOur media is publishing reams of articles on the elections in Afghanistan, so I thought I'd highlight excerpts of articles written by a US commentator and another from the UK.In his In Afghanistan, the Choice Is Ours in The New York Times, Richard N. Haass writes this:Making this assessment in Afghanistan is difficult. The Taliban are resourceful and patient and can use Pakistan as a sanctuary. It is not obvious that Afghans can overcome ethnic and tribal loyalties, corruption and personal rivalries. No matter who is declared the winner, yesterday’s election is almost certain to leave the country even more divided. There needs to be a limit to what the United States does in Afghanistan...

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Posted in: Afghanistan

Rahman Roslan: Dark Secrets

Photo © Rahman Roslan-All Rights ReservedRahman Roslan is a freelance photojournalist and documentary photographer based in Kuala Lumpur, whose specialty is in news and documentary photography. A self-taught photographer, he started his craft a few years ago, and quickly gained recognition for his talents. His work was published in E9 magazine, The National UAE, Sutra Magazine, The New Internationalist, Berita Harian Singapore, Strait Times Singapore, and UNESCO Korea amongst others, as well as freelancing for wire agencies such as AFP and Reuters in Kuala Lumpur.He is one of the alum of the Angkor Photography Festival, and won the emerging talent award at the 2009 Foundry Photojournalism Workshop which was held in Manali, for his work on the...

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Posted in: India,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism

The Black Snapper

As my readers know, one of The Travel Photographer blog's objectives is to assist emerging photographers in getting better known, and contribute in introducing their work to a wider audience.Many other blogs and web magazines do this as well. Burn, 100Eyes, Verve Photo and others are showcasing the work of emerging and creative photographers extremely well, and have done much to introduce new talent into the limelight.A newly formed web magazine The Black Snapper has joined in this commendable task on August 1st 2009. The Black Snapper daily presents a photographer selected by one of its guest curators, and the expectation is to present a new series of 8-20 photos each day.According to its About blurb: The Black Snapper aims to create an online...

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Posted in: Innovative Stuff,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism

Ralph Childs: Bhutan

Photo © Ralph N. Childs-All Rights ReservedPhoto © Ralph N. Childs-All Rights ReservedI will be leading the Bhutan: Land Of Druk Yul photo expedition in the coming few weeks, and thought it would be appropriate to usher in its final preparation phase by featuring some of the work by the talented participants who joined the 2008 expedition.Here are two photographs by Chicago-based Ralph Childs who maintains the blog RNC Photography. Both images are of performers at the famed festivals known as tsechus; which are annual religious Bhutanese festivals held in each district of Bhutan during specific days of the lunar Tibetan calendar. I chose these photographs because of their colors and motion.Ralph works for one of the largest American aerospace...

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Posted in: Bhutan,Photographers: Travel

New Canon G11 Announced

The photography enthusiasts and blogosphere are buzzing with the news that Canon has announced the flagship 10.0-megapixel PowerShot G11 with a retail price of $499. Yes, the new model features a lower resolution in order to create larger individual pixels on the imaging chip that absorb more light. According to Canon, the system combines the new 10MP chip; optical image stabilization; and the camera's Digic IV image processor to produce better images in low light at high ISOs. Some professionals have asked for a halt to increasing cameras' resolution since it also increases noise when using small imaging sensors.Notwithstanding Gary Knight's experience with the G10, it will take a miracle to convince me to part (again) with almost $500 to...

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Posted in: Hard Gear

Bas Uterwijk: Kushti Wrestling

Photo © Bas Uterwijk-All Rights ReservedBas Uterwijk is a Dutch photojournalist, is an alum of the Foundry Photojournalism Workshops in Mexico City and Manali (India) and, while in Delhi, photographed Kushti wrestling. He is now a full time photojournalist, having been a computer graphics artist for a video game company.Kushti is one of India's indigenous forms of wrestling, but from a royal spectacle has slowly turned into a dying form of sport, but recent efforts are being exerted to revive it. It's also practiced in Pakistan and Iran, and with some differences in Turkey.Its practitioners have to adopt a rigorous daily regimen consisting of aerobic and weight exercises; nourishing the soil at the akhara where they wrestle, and eating a diet...

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Posted in: India,Photographers: Travel,Photojournalism

Wink Willett: Bhutan

Photo © Wink Willett-All Rights ReservedPhoto © Wink Willett-All Rights ReservedI will be leading the Bhutan: Land Of Druk Yul photo expedition in the coming few weeks, and thought it would be appropriate to usher in its final preparation phase by featuring some of the work by the talented participants who joined the 2008 expedition.To kick us off, here are two brilliant portraits by Wink Willett. One is a spontaneous portrait, while the second is more posed, although if I recall correctly the monk was already in this position when Wink arrived at the scene. The top portrait is of a lay nun, spinning her prayer wheel and circumbulating around the Jakhar temple, while the second is of a Buddhist monk at a monastery, bathed in a wonderful light.Wink...

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Posted in: Bhutan,Photo Tours

Geoffrey Hiller: The Bangladesh Project

Geoffrey Hiller is an award winning multimedia artist, a teacher of interactive media, a photographer and the editor of Verve Photo, which he describes as having showcased the work of close to 300 photographers. However, he returns to this blog's pages for his The Bangladesh Project.Geoffrey has lived and taught in Dhaka from August 2008 to May 2009 on a Fulbright Scholarship, teaching interactive media, and has now published a dedicated website for his The Bangladesh Project in which he showcases a number of photographic galleries such as Faces, Islam, The River, Hindu Culture, to name but a few, of images made in this photogenic and magnetic country. Geoffrey and his students have been photographing everywhere in Dhaka...in the streets, on...

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Posted in: Bangladesh,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism

Global Post: The Taliban

With so much in the news about Afghanistan, I thought I'd join the fray and feature this collaboration between GlobalPost and MediaStorm.According to its producers, Life, Death and the Taliban seeks to "enhance America’s understanding of Taliban history in Afghanistan and Pakistan". Charles Sennott of GlobalPost reviews the group’s rise to power and looks at current political and counterinsurgency efforts in Afghanistan.To cut through through the constant rubbish, biased and lazy reporting, and outright misinformation fed to us by the US mainstream media is a tall order, and as evidenced by the convoluted, and sometimes awkward, reporting in this piece, there are many facets to the Taliban. While I don't dispute GlobalPost's intentions, I...

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Posted in: Afghanistan,Multimedia,Photojournalism

Comment: Complex vs Simple Multimedia

Chandni Chowk - Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights ReservedI received an email from a friend and veteran photojournalist, who participated in one of my earlier Introduction To Multimedia Storytelling classes. His comments are in response to my earlier post POV: Complex vs Simple Multimedia. While I don't usually publish or publicly react to the frequent comments I get, I decided to make an exception here because (i) the wise commentary is from a working-in-the-field photographer, and (ii) because of my personal and professional respect for this photojournalist. (Some phrases have been redacted from the email). "I appreciated your comments in your blog post. Dhiraj Singh's project was an excellent example for your advocacy of keeping things simple.Being...

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Posted in: Multimedia,Photojournalism

David Hagerman: Food & Travel

Photo © David Hagerman-All Rights ReservedDavid Hagerman attended the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop in Manali, but I only met him during the final evening during which all participants showcased their projects. Most participants were extremely busy working on their projects and, apart from a chance encounter on the streets, they found it difficult to meet other participants in other classes....so networking was most active during these social events.We had a couple of conversations between the presentations, and while exchanging complaints (and business cards) about the warm Kingfisher beers in our hands, I discovered that he lives and works in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia where, with freelance writer Robyn Eckhardt, produces the well-known EatingAsia...

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Posted in: Photographers: Travel

Nikon Photo Contest International 2009

Photo © Maung Maung Gyi-All Rights ReservedPhoto © Danny Ghitis-All Rights ReservedThe Nikon Corporation recently announced winners of the Nikon Photo Contest International 2008-2009. This year's theme, "At The Heart of the Image," drew over 51,000 entries by over 18,000 entrants from 153 countries and regions. The judges were professionals working internationally in various photographic fields, most of whom were from Japan, with Ami Vitale, Alptekin Baloglu and Claudia Hinterseer. The judges selected a total of 34 winners: one Grand Prize winner and one NIKKOR 75th Anniversary Award winner, in addition to the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Prize winners for each category.The Grand Prize was awarded to Maung Maung Gyi of Myanmar for his work entitled "Cave...

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Posted in: Contests,Events,Photographers: Travel

TIME: Paula Bronstein's Gitmo Detainees

Photo © Paula Bronstein/Courtesy TIME-All Rights ReservedTIME magazine recently featured a series of portraits of released Gitmo detainees by Paula Bronstein. The stories of how these men were captured and eventually detained in Guantanamo are chilling, and underscore how impervious the American government and military were to the articles of Geneva Convention and international law, including habeas corpus. The portrait above is of Haji Nasrat, an Afghan farmer who at 77 was Guantanamo's oldest prisoner. Partially paralyzed for more than 15 years and illiterate, Nasrat says he does not know why the Americans detained him. Let's ponder on the reaction in Nasrat's village when he returned; jubilation at first and then rage at his being unjustly...

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Posted in: Afghanistan,Photojournalism

Emilio Morenatti: Injured In Afghanistan

Photo © Associated Press/Emilio Morenatti-All Rights ReservedThe New York Times's LENS blog reported that Emilio Morenatti, a 40-year-old photographer for The Associated Press was badly wounded Tuesday in southern Afghanistan when the vehicle in which he was riding was struck by a roadside bomb. Morenatti's work from the Middle East has been likened to artwork. He currently is on his way to world class treatment in a hospital in the UAE.All media (mainstream and blogs) reporting these news are unanimous in their praise for Morenatti's remarkable talent, his sensitivity and commitment to photojournalism. May he be well so...

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Posted in: Afghanistan,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism

Larry Larsen: Gnawa Photo Expedition

Photo © Larry Larsen -All Rights ReservedI organized the Gnawa (or Ganoua) Photo Expedition in late June, which was joined by a number of talented full-time and part time photographers, whose principal objective was to photograph the legendary Gnawa musicians during the 12th Essaouira Music Festival.Photo © Larry Larsen -All Rights ReservedThis is the fourth of a series of posts which showcase a sample of the participating photographers' work, and it is by Larry Larsen, a Seattle-based artist and photographer. Larry's biography tells us that he was a boilermaker welder for 30 years, but now retired, he's following his true passion in fine art. He learned how to turn on a computer in 2000, began learning Photoshop, and acquired a digital camera...

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Posted in: Morocco,Photographers: Travel

100Eyes: Bangladesh x Bangladesh

I'm surprised that it seems I haven't yet mentioned 100Eyes ...along with one or two other similarly oriented photography magazines, it's one of the best on the internet. This issue is all about Bangladesh and Bangladeshi photographers. 100Eyes is Andy Levin's brainchild. Andy was a contributing photographer with the original Life Magazine, and started his career as a staff photographer for the Black Star agency in 1985, where he completed contract assignments for magazines including National Geographic, Time, Newsweek, and Fortune. He was awarded numerous awards and recognitions, and is now involved with various projects in New Orleans.There is no question that there is a Bangladeshi school of photography, which was strongly influenced by...

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Posted in: Photojournalism

POV: Simple vs Complex Multimedia

Chandni Chowk - Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights ReservedHaving now gotten rid of flu symptoms and of my jet lag, I think I settled a lingering thought that made its presence felt during the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop earlier this month. The class I taught was Introduction To Multimedia Storytelling, and its whole premise was based on encouraging its participants to concentrate on the story, rather than on the application, and how to make quick work of slideshow production by using SoundSlides, by using their own images and audio generated in the field, and to produce a cogent photo story under the simulation of publishing deadlines. Now, I realize that the big name newspapers and mainstream media have teams of photo editors and sound...

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Posted in: Multimedia,POV

Pop Photo: My Interview

What is it Like to be a...Travel Photographer? That's the question I was asked by Carolina Hidalgo of Popular Photography, who talked to me a few weeks ago, part of an ongoing project in which she interviews several professional photographers about how they landed their dream jobs. I often remember Costa Manos' admonishment that I needed to 'complicate' my photographs...to make them less simple, and to have them tell a story. Some 10 years ago in Old Havana where he was teaching a street photography workshop, he was the one who planted the seed of storytelling in my consciousness. I recall my ego being badly bruised at first, but it quickly recovered when I realized he was exactly right.Popular Photography & Imaging, also called Popular...

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Posted in: Photo Interviews,TTP Show Off

AFAR Magazine

Candace Feit emailed me saying that her photograph made in the Moroccan Atlas mountains was published as the cover of the premiere issue of AFAR magazine.Coincidentally, The New York Times (and other newspapers) published articles announcing AFAR's "birth", hailing the courage of the two entrepreneurs who started the venture in the current economic climate, despite their lack of experience.The founders, Greg Sullivan and Joe Diaz, describe their magazine (based out of San Francisco) as having an emphasis on "experiential travel". While the magazine will carry conventional travel features, it will stay away from articles on luxury hotels and designer golf courses. AFAR is scheduled to be published six times of year, with a newsstand price of...

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Posted in: Innovative Stuff,Photographers: Photojournalists

Functionality & Style

Readers of this blog will perhaps recall my pre departure post in which I agonized over which camera bag I would take with me to the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop in distant Manali. I eventually chose to take my delightfully small (but capacious) Domke F-8 and an IDF Messenger Bag, which I combined into a single (sort of) carry-on by using a couple of carabiners.In fact, Steven Frischling of the Flying With Fish blog has written an interesting article about combining two bags to create a single carry on for photographers who fly, which is based on the same concept.The combination of the Domke F-8 and the IDF Messenger Bag worked perfectly, especially for the marathon bus drives from Delhi to Manali and back.The above was about functionality,...

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Posted in: POV

NY Times: One in 8 Million

Photo © Todd Heisler/NYTimes-All Rights ReservedOne of the "props" I used very effectively during my Intro To Multimedia Storytelling class at the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop is the stunning work done by The New York Times photographer Todd Heisler (along with others) with the One In 8 Million series. The class participants watched The Medical Tourist, and realized how effective a few stills and well edited audio can be in storytelling.One of the participants in my class, Dar Yasin, was so captivated by what he viewed that he decided to base his multimedia SoundSlides project on the One In 8 Million series, and produced a black & white photo essay on The Street Barber, a 3 minute window into the life of Shyam, a barber in the streets...

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Posted in: Multimedia,Photojournalism,Soundslides

Matt Brandon: Bangla Sahib Gurudwara

Photo © Matt Brandon-All Rights ReservedMatt Brandon of The Digital Trekker blog has produced Bangla Sahib Gurudwara, a SoundSlides photo essay on the most prominent Sikh gurudwara (or Sikh house of worship) in Delhi. The gurudwara is known for its association with the eighth Sikh Guru, Guru Har Krishan, and for the pond inside its complex, known as the "Sarovar", whose water is considered holy by Sikhs. It was built by Sikh General, Sardar Bhagel Singh in 1783, who supervised the construction of nine Sikh shrines in Delhi in the same year, during the reign of Mughal Emperor, Shah Alam II.It is situated in the Connaught Place area of Delhi, and is instantly recognizable by its stunning golden dome. While in Delhi for the Foundry Workshop, I...

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Posted in: India,Photographers: Travel,Soundslides

Tyler Hicks: Afghanistan's Elections

Photo © Tyler Hicks/NYTimes-All Rights ReservedThe New York Times is featuring Tyler Hicks' photographs of the currently under way Afghan elections in a slide show titled A Precarious Election. The accompanying article is by Carlotta Gall, and this caught my eye:"With Taliban insurgents active in half the country, many Afghans remain doubtful that the Aug. 20 election will take place at all. The Taliban issued a statement last week calling for a boycott, a threat that could deter voters in much of the south, where the insurgency is strongest."Reading the rest of the article, i couldn't help wondering if what we describe as the so-called Taliban are merely Pashtuns who are alienated from the increasingly corrupt government infrastructure. The...

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Posted in: Afghanistan,Photographers: Photojournalists,Photojournalism

National Geographic Photo Contest 2009

The National Geographic Society has announced its international photography contest 2009, for which English-language-edition readers in Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, Republic of Ireland, South Africa, the United States and the United Kingdom are eligible to enter up to a total of six photographs across three categories: People, Places and Nature.The contest began Wednesday, Aug. 5, and ends Saturday, Oct. 31, 2009. The entries will be judged at National Geographic headquarters by a panel of three judges: National Geographic staff photographer Mark Thiessen; design editor of the international editions of National Geographic magazine Darren Smith; and White House photo editor Jenn Poggi. First-place category winners of the English-language-edition...

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Posted in: Contests

Foundry Photojournalism Workshop

Here are the photographers/photojournalists who volunteered to teach at the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop in Manali.From left to right: (instructors in bold) Tewfic El-Sawy, Jerry Mossy, Kael Alford, Michael Robinson-Chavez, Mansi Midha, Guy Calaf, Eric Beecroft (FPW founder), Andrea Bruce, Adrian Fisk, Neal Jackson, Kirsten Luce, Adriana Zehbrauskas, Ron Haviv. Missing from the line up are Ami Vitale and Henrik Kastenskov.Yes. mother...it's a beer bottle in my ha...

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Posted in: Events,Photojournalism

Ami Vitale Does The New Nikon D300s

While I was in the wilderness of Manali last week, the buzz amongst the workshop's participants was about Nikon's new D300S, an updated version of its successful mid-level DSLR. The D300S offers full 720p HD video recording at 24 fps, a 7 fps (see that, Canon?) continuous shooting and Dual CF and SD card slots, and its selling price is $1799.As it happens, Ami Vitale was one of the instructors at the workshop, and she has done some video work with the D300S. It now appears here on the Nikon website.I'm always skeptical of advertisements of that type, but if push comes to shove I'd rather have a photographer like Ami showing her work, than having a corporate-generated clip showing how great the camera is. In reality, it's not simple to move...

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Posted in: Hard Gear